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Taurahe
Taurahe (from tawrahe language) is the language spoken by the Tauren from the Warcraft universe. This article is written about ceremonial Taurahe, which is consistent among most tribes. Notes about dialects, specifically the Bloodhoof dialect, will appear in boxes labelled "haso noo tawrahe lawmna pawkahotekem" the Bloodhoof accent. Phonology Taurahe has 4 vowels, 4 semivowels, 2 diphthongs, and 12 consonants. Vowels There are 4 vowels, /e ø a o/, which correspond to œ ɑ ɔ. Vowels contrast in rounding and backness, but not height, and are generally all open-mid. All vowels can be doubled in length, which may have an effect on the vowel quality. There are also 2 falling diphthongs, /aw/ and /ay/. All vowels/diphthongs can be nasalized with some bilabial coarticulation, written as m following the vowel. : Semiconsonants Each vowel corresponds with a semiconsonant, which is articulated when that vowel appears in the syllable onset. In the Taurahe script, no distinction is made between "e" and "y", "ø" and "r", or "o" and "w". However, due to historical phonological changesIn older forms of Taurahe, ɫ did not exist. In syllable onset, /a/ → ɰ, and /ɮ/ existed as a voiced lateral fricative corresponding to /s/, parallel to /d/, which is phonetically a voiced lateral plosive corresponding to /t/. Eventually, these two phonemes merged to ɫ., "a" and "l" are treated as distinct despite their relationship parallel to that of the other vowels and semiconsonants. */a/ → /l/ ɫ */e/ → /y/ jˠ */ø/ → /r/ ~ ɹˠ */o/ → /w/ w Consonants Lastly, there are 12 full consonants, /t d s st ts n p f m k h ng/. The orthography here only roughly corresponds to its English counterpart. /st/, /ts/, and /ng/ function as single phonemes rather than consonant clusters. : Word Structure Words typically contain 1, 2, or 3 syllables. The most common syllable structure is CV, but V may appear in σ1 or in syllables if the vowel matches the preceding one, such as σ3 in /ta.ho.o'/ ''tongue. Forming a sentence Sentences are composed of phrases, discrete noun and verb phrases which move together. The typical phrase order is subject-verb-object, but this is not rigidly followed, as the role marker is more important. Noun Phrases Noun phrases are composed of four pieces of information: the '''class, the role, any adjectives if applicable, and finally the noun itself. Classes Taurahe has six noun classes. They are not arbitrary and are typically intuitive. The majority of nouns fall into one of the first four classes, since the final two are very limited in breadth. Each of these class words can stand alone to mean him, her, it, or are sometimes untranslatable. : Roles The second part of the determiner is the thematic role. This typically tells how it relates to the verb phrase. The two most common roles are yo and so. Yo is only used to set up the subject of active verbs. So is used as the subject of stative verbs, and for other arguments relating directly to the verb. This is explained in the verb phrases section. Na is explained in the referents section. : : Referents There are three adjectives known as referents: mada, royoma, and noo. Each one acts as a possessive (his, her, its, their, our) for the corresponding noun phrase. Mada refers to the yo phrase, royoma to a nearby so phrase, and noo to a nearby na phrase. : In this example, noo acts as the word "its", where "it" refers to soohalo, the head noun of the noun phrase lawna soohalo, "the Tauren". Pronomial Phrases Class tags can stand on their own, acting as English pronouns, if they are preceded by the appropriate case tag. The two words ana "I" and tsee "you" are also used in this way. Pronouns can also be combined with a hyphen, such as ana-tsee "we", literally "me-you". : Verb Phrases Perhaps the most important part of the sentence is the verb phrase, and every proper sentence will have at least one. Like noun phrases, the verb phrase follows a pattern: tense marker, any adverbs as desired, and the verb proper. Tense markers The tense markers are short, standalone words that indicate the tense of the verb. The past tense refers to events that happened a relatively long time ago. Events in the present are happening as the phrase is being said, as well as generic truths or habits. The remote future contrasts with the predictive future in that they refer to certain and uncertain events, respectively. : Active versus Stative Verbs are either active or stative. Active verbs typical involve voluntary effort, such as running, hunting, or eating. Stative verbs involve less voluntary actions, such as sleeping, being seen, falling in love, or having a quality. Valency Every verb must have at least one argument, which is typically the subject, or the object in passive constructions. Monovalent verbs have a single argument. The verb type, active or stative, is important now because it determines whether the argument uses yo or so. Active verbs use yo. Stative verbs use so. For monovalent verbs, the verb phrase moves in front of the subject phrase, unless the sentence is passive. : : Some active verbs can be made passive by using so instead of yo. Compare the wolf example above with: : Multivalent verbs take two or more arguments: active verbs take one yo and so, while stative verbs take multiple so. For stative verbs, phrase order becomes important because the agent of the verb will appear before the verb. : The following example illustrates the effects of word order. : This sentences essentially states, "I, you, love." The verb pooka uses so for both parties regardless of who loves whom. By placing both noun phrases anga and tsay before the verb phrase, neither takes precedence. This leaves us with a sentence "we love". However, pooka is multivalent, so both anga and tsay cannot be the subject. The sentence is ambiguous, but phrase order can resolve this ambiguity. Note that it is not important whether anga appears before or after tsay, it is only their order with regards to the verb that matters. *''So anga so tsay te pooka'': I love you or you love me. *''Te pooka so anga so tsay'': We are loved by each other. *''So anga te pooka so tsay'': I love you. *''So tsay te pooka so anga'': You love me. Mythology :